The present invention relates to dispensing machines for printed publications, and more particularly to a machine suitable for vending of newspapers, magazines and the like.
Newspaper and magazine vending machines are conventionally placed in high traffic areas to maximize exposure of the publication to the public. The preferred locations are bus stops, lobbies of public buildings, busy street corners and the like. As a general rule, the newspapers and magazines are stacked in a hollow housing, which is provided with a coin box for receipt of payment from the public.
Once the necessary amount has been deposited, the buyer pulls the front door of the vending machine open and withdraws one copy from the stack of newspapers or magazines positioned in the housing. However, such machines allow access to the entire inventory positioned in the vending machine, without any restrictions as to the number of copies a purchaser retrieves. In some cases, theft of newspapers caused substantial losses to the vending machine owner/operator.
To prevent such losses, the industry realized a need for a dispensing machine that would allow to separate one copy of such publication from the supply of publications in the vending machine and dispense only one copy at a time. Some of known solutions is to use a ratchet mechanism that pulls out one copy of vertically positioned papers and carries them to the dispensing channel. Other approaches use a conveyor-type endless belt or belts for carrying one copy to the dispensing channel.
While such designs can work satisfactory in some environments, there is still a need for a simple to operate, inexpensive dispensing mechanism capable of carefully metering the number of copies removed from the inventory, so as to dispense only one copy at a time.
An additional consideration is the difference in thickness of daily newspapers as compared to Sunday papers. Conventionally, Sunday papers have considerably more pages, advertising inserts, which increase the fold thickness of the newspaper to one inch or more. It is preferred that the vending machine be capable of dispensing different thickness papers without major adjustments by an operator.
The patents and application listed above disclose dispensing machines with upwardly inclined ramps, along which newspapers are pushed to a dispensing opening. In these machines, the newspapers are aligned vertically, with a fold of a newspaper resting on the bearing surface of the ramp and unfolded edges of the papers facing upwardly.
When advertising inserts are included between sections of the newspaper, the single fold becomes thicker than the unfolded edge. Newspaper, being printed on relatively thin paper, has little vertical stiffness, which causes the paper to "sag" on the ramp. An upwardly oriented push plate helps keep the newspapers in a generally vertical orientation as they are dispensed, one by one, due to the provision of a metering brake adjacent the dispensing opening.
In such machines, the ramp surface is intentionally made smooth to prevent damage to newspapers and use as little of battery power as possible. Still, when the newspaper is particularly voluminous a careful balance must be worked out between a high coefficient of static friction while maintaining a low coefficient of sliding friction. This balance will help in preventing newspapers from sagging and slipping over the metering brake.
Another problem that was encountered during testing is tendency of Sunday edition papers to "fall apart" or open during vending due to a large number of inserts and advertising sections. It was discovered that the amount of pressure applied to the front face of the newspapers affects the performance of the dispensing machine. Daily papers, for example, need little pressure to be neatly dispensed, while Sunday papers require greater amount of pressure. The present invention contemplates elimination of drawbacks associated with the prior art and provision of a dispensing machine for printed publications that is automatically adjustable for the speed of dispensing, the amount of pressure on the front face of the newspaper and that almost eliminates "pushing" action of the push plate, thus reducing friction of the newspaper moving up the ramp.